PaperSpecsGallery.com Presents: The Pool Stationery

Built around what used to be the Pool Room of the former Four Seasons restaurant in Manhattan, The Pool restaurant derives its name from the square body of water that sits at its center. Otherwise it is quite understated in terms of its setting - an elegant quality that is echoed in its stationery, designed by Pandiscio Green and printed by DataGraphic, which impresses without ever being showy.

And “impression” is the key word here. This is especially the case with The Pool’s gift card holders and notecards, which both feature the same signature motif blind embossed on 130-lb. Mohawk Superfine Ultrawhite Smooth Cover using the same die.

Not only does the design - rendered in tiny embossed dots - evoke everything from fish scales to the idiosyncratic curtains that hang in this well-known Park Avenue seafood restaurant, the sparse amount of printing on show here makes the bright white and tactile qualities of the paper do all the work. Particularly impressive is the registration DataGraphic achieved on the cover of the gift card holder between the single-fish pattern it offset printed and the registered emboss: we’re left with the impression of 37 tiny, expertly printed dots that make up the fish. (I counted. :-))

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With the check presentation folder, we get a different riff on the same dot-pattern theme. But instead of embossing, each dot is the result of foil stamping with Kurz Laser Holographic Foil on 130-lb. Colorplan Cool Blue Cover.

However, it is with The Pool’s business cards that this piscine motif really jumps out at you. Once again DataGraphic turned to Mohawk Superfine Ultrawhite Smooth Cover. This time they flooded it with PMS 2138 except for the areas that they wanted to remain white. They then applied a registered emboss to that part of the card, leaving behind that now-familiar dot pattern, which pops beautifully against the blue background of the card.

This suite is rounded out by:

Letterhead: A simple affair in comparison to the other pieces, digitally printed on Neenah Classic Crest Windsor Blue Smooth Text and featuring the restaurant’s logo

Another, less playful version of the business cards. These are letterpress printed and feature logos both for The Pool and The Grill, another restaurant that was formerly a part of the Four Seasons - this one the Grill Room - located in the same building.

In all, the stationery for The Pool is as elegant yet as understated as the decor of the Park Avenue dining destination it represents.